ANACOUSTIC MODES OF SOUND CONSTRUCTION: ENCODED (IM)MATERIALITY IN SYNTHESIS By ROBERT SEABACK A DISSERTATION PRESENTED TO THE GRADUATE SCHOOL OF THE UNIVERSITY OF FLORIDA IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY UNIVERSITY OF FLORIDA 2018 © 2018 Robert Seaback 2 To my parents 3 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS Special thanks to my dissertation chair Paul Koonce for guidance throughout this process and for his generosity with time, attention, and knowledge. Thanks to Jack Stenner for introducing me to literature that inspired much of the content of this dissertation. Many thanks to the composition faculty at the University of Florida for the Graduate Fellowship Award, with which I have had the privilege to teach and compose music as a Ph.D. student. I am indebted to my teachers and peers at Northeastern University and Mills College, who have broadened my horizons and inspired me in our common pursuit of meaning via the arts. I express my deepest gratitude to my family who have supported me throughout my journey, and to my friends who have kept me sane along the way. 4 TABLE OF CONTENTS page ACKNOWLEDGMENTS .................................................................................................. 4 LIST OF FIGURES .......................................................................................................... 7 ABSTRACT ..................................................................................................................... 9 CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION .................................................................................................... 11 2 BACKGROUND ...................................................................................................... 14 Digital Sound Synthesis .......................................................................................... 14 Standard Synthesis .......................................................................................... 16 Acoustic resonance .................................................................................... 17 Additive synthesis ...................................................................................... 18 Subtractive synthesis ................................................................................. 18 Modulation synthesis ................................................................................. 19 Physical modeling ...................................................................................... 19 Granular synthesis ..................................................................................... 19 Nonstandard Synthesis .................................................................................... 20 Audification ....................................................................................................... 21 Precurors ................................................................................................................ 22 Effective and Control Mechanisms ......................................................................... 25 3 SEMIOTICS ............................................................................................................ 28 Synthesis vs. Sampling ........................................................................................... 29 Sound as Signifier ................................................................................................... 33 Endnote .................................................................................................................. 34 4 INFORMATION AND NOISE .................................................................................. 35 Digital Audio Information ......................................................................................... 35 MTC ................................................................................................................. 35 Audio Encoding ................................................................................................ 36 Parametric and Non-parametric Models ........................................................... 37 The Information/Matter Duality ................................................................................ 42 Note on Posthumanism ........................................................................................... 44 Cybernetic Noise .................................................................................................... 45 5 COMPOSERS AND SYSTEMS .............................................................................. 51 Sound Synthesis Program ...................................................................................... 51 5 SSP Technical Details ...................................................................................... 52 Acoustic Salvage .............................................................................................. 56 Dual Addresses in Computer Art ...................................................................... 57 SSP Conclusion ............................................................................................... 60 SAWDUST .............................................................................................................. 61 SAWDUST: Technical Details .......................................................................... 62 SAWDUST and Anticommunication ................................................................. 63 Response to Dust ............................................................................................. 66 GENDY ................................................................................................................... 68 GENDY Technical Details ................................................................................ 70 The Materiality of Informatics ........................................................................... 72 Response to Gendy3 ........................................................................................ 76 Musica Iconologos .................................................................................................. 78 Musica Iconologos Technical Details ............................................................... 79 Flickering Signifiers .......................................................................................... 83 Post-Digital ............................................................................................................. 85 Dataphonics ..................................................................................................... 88 6 SOUNDS OF SYNTHESIS ..................................................................................... 95 Resonance Analysis ............................................................................................... 95 Acousmatic Bodies ................................................................................................. 96 Invariance ............................................................................................................... 99 Spectral Invariance ......................................................................................... 100 Tonal Balance ................................................................................................ 104 Anechoic Spaces ............................................................................................ 108 Conclusion ............................................................................................................ 109 7 ANACOUSTIC MODES OF COMPOSITION ........................................................ 110 Semiotics of Virtuality............................................................................................ 110 Microsound ........................................................................................................... 113 sequence (bloom) ................................................................................................. 115 in surge ................................................................................................................. 116 Virtuality in Classic Works ..................................................................................... 121 Final Thoughts ...................................................................................................... 123 LIST OF REFERENCES ............................................................................................. 125 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH .......................................................................................... 131 6 LIST OF FIGURES Figure page 4-1 Sampling and quantization. ................................................................................ 37 4-2 Individual samples of one millisecond of a complex waveform. .......................... 39 4-3 Sine wavetable. .................................................................................................. 40 4-4 Sum of 100 harmonically related sines wavetable. ............................................. 40 4-5 Sum of 100 harmonically related sines oscillator bank. ...................................... 41 4-6 Parametric network of interconnected unit generators. ...................................... 41 4-7 The semiotics of virtuality. .................................................................................. 49 5-1 SSP selection principle TENDENCY. ................................................................. 54 5-2 List of values generated with TENDENCY. .......................................................